Ulrich E. Stegmann

I’m a Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Aberdeen (UK). Initially I trained as a biologist, studying insect maternal care in Malaysian rainforests for a PhD (2000, Würzburg). Then I switched to philosophy (PhD 2006, King’s College London). In 2016 I was a Visiting Associate Professor for the Philosophy of the Life Sciences at Utrecht University.

My research focuses on the history and philosophy of the life sciences. I am particularly interested in causation, mechanistic explanation and purportedly informational or representational phenomena. Much of my work addresses these issues in the context of molecular biology and animal behaviour studies. The overall goal of my work is a better understanding of biology as it is actually practiced, its fundamental concepts, its ontological commitments, its tools and methods. Some of my work employs historical research to address philosophical questions.